Posted
by
Soulskillon Sunday December 27, 2009 @02:31PM
from the blast-from-the-past dept.

The Bad Astronomer writes "Five years ago today (December 27, 2004), a vast wave of high-energy gamma and X-rays washed over the Earth, blinding satellites and partially ionizing the Earth's atmosphere. The culprit was a superflare from the magnetar SGR 1806-20, located 50,000 light years away. The energy released was mind-numbing: in one-fifth of a second, this supercharged magnetic neutron star blasted out as much energy as the Sun does in 250,000 years!"

So there's no scientific value in saying, for example, that 0% of lab rats survive being placed in 0 degree salt water for 2+ hours then? How about for 90 minutes? What about 45 minutes? When exactly DO they survive?

Of course science can prove negatives. It doesn't matter if you're demonstrating how something works, or CLEARLY demonstrating how it DOESN'T work (which usually leads to a rethink and experimental redesign to find an alternative hypothesis). Science is concerned with REPRODUCIBLE RESULTS. A hypothesis that is thrown out still has value - it prevents someone else from going down that path. If you think in absolutes, you are more likely than not to be suffering from distortions and perhaps "religion".